Urgent Update: Western Governments Are Copying China’s Surveillance Playbook – While Big Tech Ignores Breaches and Pushes for More of Your Data
Dear Supporters,
The pattern is now unmistakable. While companies like Crunchyroll suffer yet another massive breach — this time exposing data on 6.8 million users through a compromised third-party vendor — they and their allies continue demanding more centralized data collection from all of us. At the same time, Western governments are quietly adopting the same tools and rhetoric used by communist China to control online behavior, all under the familiar banner of “protecting children.”
In China, the government mandates real-name verification tied to national ID databases, enforces strict daily gaming time limits for minors, and dictates exactly what content is “appropriate” for the population to consume. Individuals have no real say — the state decides. Western leaders are now imitating this model. The UK’s Online Safety Act has rolled out widespread age verification requirements that force adults to submit IDs, face scans, or other biometrics to access legal content on social media, porn sites, forums, and more. The result? A documented surge in VPN usage as people try to reclaim basic privacy, while platforms engage in over-censorship that chills speech for everyone.
Here in the U.S., the same creep is happening at the state and federal level. Bills like the App Store Accountability Act (and parallel state laws in California, Colorado, and beyond) push for persistent age-broadcasting baked directly into operating systems — making your age and identity queryable by every app on your phone, computer, or device. Lobbying records show Meta (Facebook) has spent tens of millions and funneled dark money through nonprofits to advance these exact measures, conveniently shifting the data-collection burden onto Apple, Google, and open-source platforms like Linux while protecting its own empire built on selling user data.
This is not protection — it is profit and control. Companies that cannot keep our data secure (see Crunchyroll’s repeated lawsuits and breaches) are the ones lobbying hardest for OS-level verification systems that centralize even more personal information. Meanwhile, landmark lawsuits against Meta and YouTube for addictive algorithms harming users expose the hypocrisy: Big Tech gets rich off engagement and data, then demands more surveillance tools while ignoring the very breaches that put millions at risk of identity theft and misuse.
The greater internet community sees through it. Privacy advocates, creators, artists, whistleblowers, and everyday users are overwhelmingly opposed to mandatory digital ID and age verification. VPN downloads have skyrocketed wherever these laws hit. Independent investigators have traced the funding. Forums, Reddit, and tech communities are sounding the alarm: this is surveillance creep disguised as safety, targeting not just children but adults who dare to speak, create, or browse freely — especially those critical of government or corporate power.
How long will we let freedoms erode one “child protection” law at a time before we demand real boundaries?
The Digital Liberty Act would stop this: prohibiting unwarranted OS-level data mandates, protecting anonymous speech, preventing surveillance creep into our personal devices, and ensuring genuine safety measures don’t become tools of centralized control and profit.
Sign the petition now if you haven’t. Read the full proposal. Share this update, comment below with your experiences, and contact your lawmakers today to reject these China-style digital ID pushes. The internet community is rising — join us before the window for real digital civil rights closes.
Defend the free and private internet.